Refrigerators are generally constructed of an outer shell, a liner defining a fresh food or freezer compartment, and an insulating layer between the shell and liner. The liner encloses all but one side of the fresh food compartment and a door, drawer, or other movable surface encloses the remaining side. The liner is typically designed to define separate compartments for the freezer and fresh food compartments.
The size of the liner, and therefore the space available is also constrained. The shell of the refrigerator is generally limited in size by industry standards, usually 32-36 inches in width, 23-29 inches in depth, and 60-84 inches in height. Sufficient insulation to keep the refrigerated and freezer compartments at an appropriate temperature also must be installed. This amount will vary by the type of insulation used, desired efficiency, air flow, and other factors. These conditions therefore limit the available space within the liner as well as the available space between the liner and shell.
Older model refrigerators only required power for a compressor to provide cooling to the fresh food and freezer compartments and therefore had fairly simple wiring requirements. Modern refrigerators route electrical wires throughout the interior of the appliance in order to control and power a variety of functions and features. Recent consumer demand for more features requires more complicated power distribution; these features include in-door ice and water dispensing, separately cooled compartments, a variety of lighting arrangements, and air circulating fans.
In order to service these demands, wire harnesses are installed between the outer shell of a refrigerator and the inner liner, passing through the insulation separating the two. One or more wiring harnesses transfers power from the input or source to a controller which distributes wire throughout the refrigerator. Additional wire harnesses from the controller to the various components generally carry one or two types of electrical current: high voltage and/or low voltage.
High voltage current is used for powering components. For example, a compressor requires a certain amount of power to operate. A wiring harnesses providing power to the compressor therefore must be sized to compensate for the amount of power required and be routed so that heating of the electrical components does not cause a fire or otherwise damage the insulation or liner.
In contrast, low voltage current is used for transferring signals between components. For example, when ice is desired from a digital ice dispenser, it is necessary to send a signal to the ice dispenser to dispense ice. The signal may take several forms, a pulse-modulated signal, amplitude or frequency modulation of a sinusoidal wave, impulse signal, or other means of electronic communication. The ice dispensing is typically performed through the use of an auger located within an ice storage bucket. A low voltage signal is sent from the control panel of the ice dispenser to the auger, indicating that the auger should be rotated to deliver ice. It is not necessary for the wire carrying this signal to be sized to the same gage as the high voltage current wires; therefore these wires can be routed more easily in narrow spaces.
Because some wiring harnesses are composed of both high and low voltage wires, the wires are generally bundled together and routed as an individual, considerably larger, strand.
Additionally, in efforts to obtain more interior space in fresh food and/or freezer compartments, components are being reduced in size and positioned in increasingly small areas. For example, in some of Assignee's products, the icemaker has been relocated to a position above the fresh food compartment while storage of ice has been relocated to the door, providing more shelf space within the body of the refrigerated compartment for storage of food or other products.
In relocating the icemaker to a position above the fresh food compartment, the amount of available space has further limited by the direction the wires need to be routed. Power supplies, converters, and controllers are located along the refrigerator door or in the body. Wires must therefore be run along the top of the refrigerator, between the shell and interior liner, before passing through the liner to the icemaker assembly. The wires must then be routed in the ice making compartment to the various components located therein.
The liner of a refrigerator is relatively thin, and therefore openings in the liner tend to have a sharp edge. Therefore, a grommet with a rounded edge and soft or otherwise protected opening is inserted into the opening to protect the wires from damage. In some cases, the grommet is integrally molded to the wires, allowing the grommet to be sized to fit the wires exactly.
In one circumstance, narrow routing requires the wiring harness to be routed in a first direction, pass through the insulation and inner liner, and then be turned 180 degrees to return from the same direction they approached.
Therefore, there has been recognized a need in the art for a grommet which allows for routing wires 180 degrees as they pass through the liner of a refrigerator.
There has been recognized a further need in the art for a method of routing wires 180 degrees within a refrigerator to avoid damage to the wires from sharp edges.
There has been recognized a further need in the art for a refrigerator with narrow openings for routing wires and attendant apparatus for accomplishing this result.
These objections and others readily apparent from the following description are sought to be accomplished by the present invention.
Other routing considerations also present persistent problems in refrigerator appliances. It is the intention of this disclosure to anticipate these problems and present solutions.
One common routing issue is transferring utilities, including electricity and water, between the refrigerator cabinet and the door of the refrigerator. With door-mounted water and ice dispensers, water, electrical signals and power must be transferred to and from the door mounted dispenser. Various products and methods of routing utilities through the door have been proposed, and the present disclosure seeks to improve the existing state of the art by presenting a novel and useful apparatus and method for routing utilities through the hinge between the refrigerator cabinet and door.
The routing of utilities from the door to the refrigerator is of particular concern because of the movement between the two components. The refrigerator door pivots about the hinge and therefore utilities routed through the hinge must be routed so that the door is not constrained from opening, nor are the lines pinched or severed in any way due to continuous and repeated openings of the door. It would therefore be preferable to have the utilities mounted through the hinge, thereby avoiding the need to provide slack in the utilities for the opening or closing of the door.
Therefore, there is recognized a need in the art for an improved method for routing utilities through the hinge between the refrigerator and door.